parenting joy

My 4-year-old told me earlier that he didn't want me to sit next to him. He said, 'you stink mummy. Please don't sit next to me'.

I was a bit insulted and wondered why he would say that. I certainly knew that I didn't smell! The cheek!

And then it turned out that he just didn't want me next to him because I kept on telling him off for sticking his fingers up his nose.

But his way of pushing me away is a bit undiplomatic, I must say.

Chore

Eugh!
Yuck!
Agh, disgusting!
[Grimace, eyes half-closed]
Ugh, horrible!


This was how my 7-year-old boy washed dishes, after we finished off two slices of banana cake.

Two hours earlier, he was happily splashing in the mud and puddles in the park.

Boys, eh?

Accounts

Facebook = deactivated (temporarily, I guess. It's so time consuming, don't you think?)

Friendster = account deleted. So childish and rubbishy. Mainly for showing off photos; not much interaction.

Yahoo Messenger = apps deleted. I hate the emoticons and the buzzes.

Twitter = maintained for now. So far, it's nice to write a line or two without thinking of an audience.

Flickr = maintained. The annual subscription is worth it.

Blog = kept but largely ignored. I can't write anymore, whatever that means. But I still continue to read other blogs. I don't write comments but I am there.


Holy ho, what baggage do we have! Time wasters, etc. It's time to continue to de-clutter and enjoy the outdoors!

sledging with my boys

RL, Paris

RL, originally uploaded by Soyy.

It's been awhile since my last post. It's all got to do with Facebook, I guess, among other things that got in the way of this sort of narcissism.

It's also got to do with fear. I am preoccupied at the moment with writing in a very specific form and a first-person narrative/descriptive style of writing is just at the opposite end of that spectrum. And so the hesitance of continuing to post here.

But here I am!

Soon, I'll be visiting yours too.

when such mundane thing as going to school becomes extraordinarily momentous... so be warned; you'll fall asleep after reading this title.

lew first day at pre-school, originally uploaded by Soyy.

I thought I should mark my 3-year-old's first day at pre-school as momentous. I wasn't as anxious as I was when his big brother started nursery. Maybe because I knew what to expect. Or that I just have too much on my plate at the moment that Lew's first day away from me was celebrated with a general clean-up of the house.

Either way, he made me very proud. His teacher's first comment was that he sat through a long story. I just smiled. I didn't have to say that we eat books at home, that for him to sit through a long story-time was just snacks for him, or light lunch. Didn't she know that we recite the words in the Oxford Dictionary as bedtime routine? Or that we sprinkle old newspapers in our porridge, because that's how you eat words!

Anyway. I also feel a bit of guilt, in that I feel a little bit of liberation. For 12 hours a week, when I am not at work, I am not a mother. Not that I cease to be someone's parent, but for those precious hours of staying at my desk, writing or reading my books, nobody would say, 'mummy, milk please!'. Now, somebody else would be fetching that milk and I could do what I want with my time, aside from doing the housework, of course.

And yet, when I went to pick him up from school, I felt like I just wanted to grab him from the teacher's arms and put him back in my womb. Just like that. I missed him but I just shifted that feeling and boxed it in.

So when I took him back home, I didn't let go of him. I cuddled him. I kissed him. I carried him around the house like a little baby. Because tomorrow, and after that, he will already have his own little world that I am not part of. And that world will grow bigger and bigger until I become just a mother in name and affection.